Unfortunately, the browser you are using to view the MicroStrategy website is no longer supported. You can continue to browse our site, however, for the best user experience, please consider updating your browser.

MicroStrategy Certified for Oracle Database In-Memory

In today’s fast-paced, technology-fueled business environment, companies are constantly looking for faster, more targeted insights that can help them gain an edge, and they want to leverage unprecedented volumes of data to do this. More than ever, organizations want instant insights into real-time transactional data.

But in traditional data systems, there’s a tradeoff. Depending on whether data is stored in row or column format, an environment can only be optimal for either transactional processing (OLTP) or analytics—not both. To analyze data in an OLTP environment (in row format), it inevitably takes a lot of work moving data over, building indexes, and creating aggregate objects. That all translates to a significant time lag between getting transactional information and actually being able to analyze it. For customers, that seriously limits the value of their data.

Great news: that’s about to change. You may have noticed our announcement, back on October 1st, that we are now certified on Oracle Database 12c with In-Memory option. Initially launched in beta in June, this integration essentially blows the top off real-time analytics by delivering unrivaled speed to customers running MicroStrategy on Oracle’s 12c database—it’s instant insights without the tradeoff. Oracle invited MicroStrategy to speak about the integration at last month’s OpenWorld event in San Francisco, and the slides from the presentation provide some details about the key advantages.

But, if you’re short on time, here’s a quick rundown of how exactly you’ll get more value from MicroStrategy with Oracle Database In-Memory:

Improved real-time analytics

With the In-Memory option, you can now run real-time, ad-hoc analytic queries on your business data as it exists at that moment to get results extremely fast (we’re talking sub-second). Users can run both operational and analytic workloads against the same tables, without having to move data to the EDW.

How? This is possible through innovative architecture where in-memory tables contain both row and column formats. This means that active, up-to-date transactional (OLTP) data can populate in row format while, simultaneously, MicroStrategy tools can access the same data in columnar format. By effectively supporting both transactional and analytical jobs, results can be delivered orders of magnitude faster—no more waiting.

Enhanced query performance

Similarly, the in-memory column removes the need for analytic indexes and features a host of querying optimizations, which translates to big gains in query performance. As a result, MicroStrategy real-time analytical tools can run extremely fast on the most up-to-date data.

Easy to adopt

It’s simple to take advantage of in-memory, as new features are completely compatible with any existing Oracle database systems. Customers don’t have to worry about any disruptive changes to the application layer and can continue using their existing data framework and MicroStrategy applications without skipping a beat.

Reduced costs

While these improved capabilities will deliver higher performance, they also reduce the costs associated with ongoing administration, maintenance, and fine-tuning; there’s less of a need to constantly move data between in-memory and data warehouse stores, and it isn’t necessary to perform frequent performance optimizations.

As the demand for instant insights on real-time data increases, more dynamic data systems make it easier to experience the full power of MicroStrategy analytics. With these capabilities, enterprises will be better equipped to get answers right when they need them, maximizing the value of their data. Moving forward, MicroStrategy will continue to work closely with Oracle to ensure tight technical integration and improve speed, scalability, and reliability for all users.

Jean-Francois is an engineer with a background in business analytics. He was a Project Coordinator for Goldfields Money Limited, leading IT implementation within the financial services industry. Jean-Francois also has experience as a consultant for EOH, an IT solutions firm in South Africa. He has expertise in SAP, is a MicroStrategy Certified Designer, and is certified in Information Technical Infrastructure Library (ITIL). In addition to pursuing technology certifications, Jean-Francois is a licensed commercial pilot with a twin-engine rating and still flies in his spare time